Benedicto’s death extinguishes liability

The late Roberto Benedicto, a sugar baron and close ally of former President Ferdinand Marcos, can no longer be held criminally liable for unlawful acts allegedly committed during the 20-year rule of the late dictator.

This was the ruling of the Supreme Court in connection with dollar-salting charges filed against the Marcos family and their alleged cronies.

"The death of the accused prior to the final judgment terminates his criminal liability as well as civil liability," Justice Leonardo Quisumbing of the SC’s second division said, referring to the Benedicto’s death on May 15 last year.

Still, the High Court junked the petitions of Benedicto and Hector Rivera for the nullification of dollar-salting charges filed against them on claims that the period for which the charges should be filed had lapsed, and that they are immune from suit.

The two had also assailed a 1996 decision of the Court of Appeals which upheld the authority of Manila Judge Guillermo Loja in trying four of 25 dollar-salting cases, including some involving former First Lady Imelda Marcos.

However, the petitions were dismissed by five justices of the second division headed by Justice Josue Bellosillo, saying no error could be attributed to the appellate court.

Under past Philippine laws, Filipino citizens were not allowed to own foreign exchange accounts overseas without first seeking the approval of the Central Bank.

The SC held that even if the laws on dollar-salting cases – CB circular Nos. 960, 1318, 1353 and Republic Act 265 – have been repealed with the enactment of the New Central Bank Act (RA 7635), this does not mean that the accused were already off the hook.

"We find that while Section 34 of RA 265 was repealed, it was nonetheless simultaneously re-enacted in Section 36 of RA 7653, This did not extinguish the criminal liability of Benedicto and Rivera for transgressions of Circular 960," the SC said.

The court explained that prescription, or the lapse of time for which the two individuals can be charged, cannot be made as a defense because of the "political reality" that they enjoyed protection from Marcos during the dictator’s rule.

"The criminal actions against Benedicto and Rivera which gave rise to the instant case were filed in 1991 and 1992, or well within the eight-year prescriptive period from February 1986," Quisumbing said.

The two men, along with Mrs. Marcos, were held liable for having a foreign exchange account abroad and for their alleged failure to report interest earnings of such to proper authorities.

The SC also ruled that the regular regional trial courts have jurisdiction over the cases because the applicable law at that time was PD 1606, which states that cases having a jail term of six years below fall in said courts and not the Sandiganbayan.

In February 1999, the SC tossed back to the Manila court three of Mrs. Marcos’ dollar-salting cases, which were dismissed by Judge David Nitafan in July 1992. She still has 21 other suits in Pasig City.

Mrs. Marcos lost her case in the SC when it gave credence to the Court of Appeals’ affirmance of Loja’s ruling that found the former first couple of having accounts in Swiss Bank Corp. in Geneva, Switzerland.

"It is time those cases from the frigidity of their present status so that the petitioner (Mrs. Marcos) may have the opportunity to prove her defense on the merits, instead of having those cases indefinitely sidelined by legal strategy contingent on expectancies," retired SC Justice Regalado wrote in September 1997.

Nitafan had been reprimanded by the SC after he dropped in July 1992 three of Marcos’ suits despite the non-filing of a motion to quash the charges.